Dan Taylor – The Conversation

‘Ridiculous costs’: Andy Pearce on his farm in the Fens of eastern England. Photograph by Rebecca Pearce

August 12, 2025

Family farmers say their way of life is an impossible dream when ‘the bread of life is worth less than rusty metal’

Dan Taylor, The Open University and Amy Gibbons, University of Nottingham

In the Fens of eastern England, small-scale farmers fear for their future amid ‘astronomical’ costs and flatlining income.

Weary hunters return from an expedition with little to show for it in the 1565 Dutch painting, Hunters in the Snow. Pieter Bruegel the Elder

March 7, 2022

The original climate crisis – how the little ice age devastated early modern Europe

Ariel Hessayon, Goldsmiths, University of London and Dan Taylor, The Open University

The little ice age unleashed famines and revolutions which tested the very bonds of society.

Usually carried out in a public context, book burning is a method of censoring cultural, religious or political opposition. Shutterstock/Collin Hawley

February 15, 2022

How 17th century’s Britain’s ‘cancel culture’ can help us understand the importance of free speech

Dan Taylor, The Open University and Ariel Hessayon, Goldsmiths, University of London

Struggles to uphold free speech throughout the centuries teach us that we should never take it for granted.

Extreme flooding in Germany caused roads and railways to be cut off. Bear productions/Shutterstock

February 9, 2022

The Sheep Look Up: cult 1970s sci‑fi novel predicted today’s climate crisis

Dan Taylor, The Open University

Sci-fi classic The Sheep Look Up has lessons for today on environmental change, says an expert.

Jacob Lund/Shutterstock

January 11, 2021

How an obscure 1909 novella that foretold the internet can guide us through the latest lockdown

Dan Taylor, The Open University

With the third national lockdown under way, how can E.M. Forster’s neglected masterpiece help us survive the next few months?

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